In Lunar Orbit

Seventy-six hours after leaving the earth, Apollo 11 neared
its goal. CapCom Bruce McCandless gave the crew the usual "see you
on the other side," as the spacecraft went behind the moon. Looking
at the surface, Collins said it looked "plaster of Paris
gray." Like earlier commanders, Armstrong had to remind his crew
not to look at it because they had to concentrate on the first lunar
orbit insertion maneuver to get into a nice elliptical flight path. The
astronauts agreed that changing sun angles produced different shades of
gray and tan. Some of their descriptions of the back, as well as the
front, of the moon were graphic. They also hoped no new meteors like
those that had caused the lunar craters would fall while they were on
the surface. Once Collins mentioned that the desolate Sea of Fertility
had certainly been miscalled, and Armstrong gave him a short lecture on
how it got its name. They shared the view of the near-earth side of the
moon with television watchers back home. Pilots and observers alike
could see that the planned landing area was still in darkness but
getting brighter each time they flew over it. The astronauts commented
that they certainly realized they were circling a smaller body than the
earth, but they quickly became used to seeing "the moon going
by." Collins complained once that the "LM just wants to head
down towards the surface," and McCandless answered, "that's
what [it] was built for."*

During the first two revolutions, the crewmen checked navigation and
trajectory figures and then fired the service module engine against the
flight path to drop Apollo 11 into a nearly circular orbit.
As they watched the landing area grow brighter and brighter, they
rested, ate, slept, and rechecked the lunar module systems. Because of
the discussions, photographs, and motion pictures provided by the Borman
and Stafford crews, the Armstrong team felt as though they were flying
over familiar ground. Aldrin said that the view was better from the
lunar module than from the command module.

At the beginning of the nine-hour rest period before Armstrong and
Aldrin crawled into the lunar module and headed for the lunar surface,
Collins urged his companions to leave the probe in the command module.
Since this would shorten their preparations for the lunar descent, they
were not hard to convince. They knew it would be wise to get as much
rest as possible before they set out on that trip but none of the three
slept as well as they had on previous nights - it was just not possible
to dismiss the next days' momentous events from their minds. They were
test pilots, but they were human.7

After breakfast on Sunday morning, 20 July, Armstrong and Aldrin floated
through the tunnel and into the lunar module. Their preparations had
been so thorough that they had little to do except wait for Collins to
close off the two vehicles. Collins slipped the probe and drogue
smoothly into place and then asked the lunar module crewmen to be
patient while he went through the checklist. Feeling that he was part of
a three-ring circus and appearing simultaneously in each ring, Collins
raced around, setting cameras up in windows to photograph the
separation, purging the fuel cells of excess water, and getting ready to
vent the air pressure from the tunnel. On the back of the moon, during
the 13th revolution, everything was ready, which gave him a short
breather before the lunar module left. When he asked, "How's the
Czar over there?" Armstrong replied, "Just hanging on - and
punching [buttons]." Collins urged the lunar pilots to take it easy
on the surface - he did not want to hear any "huffing and
puffing." And so they parted, as Armstrong called out, "The
Eagle has wings."

Armstrong and Aldrin began checking the lander's critical systems. One
of these made everyone a little nervous. They had to turn off the
descent stage batteries to see how those in the ascent stage were
operating. If they were not working properly, every electrically powered
system in the cabin would be affected. But the ascent stage performed
beautifully. Next they fired the thrusters and marveled at the ease with
which the Eagle flew in formation with
Columbia. Aldrin turned on the landing radar, and it also
worked properly. Collins broke in to ask them to turn on their blinking
tracking light, and Aldrin replied that it was on.

Meanwhile, Collins found that the command ship was also stable.
Sometimes the automatic attitude thrusters did not have to make
corrections oftener than once in five minutes. Once his vehicle bucked
when he inadvertently brushed against the handcontroller, but he quickly
stilled the motion. Soon he reestablished contact with flight control
and reported that the Eagle was coming around the corner.8

* The lunar module, which weighed
more than the command and service modules combined, was feeling the pull
of the moon's gravity.